Tuesday, March 17, 2015

Israeli Agriculture, Modern and High Tech

Two weeks ago, I attended an agricultre seminar given by the Israel
embassy here in Manila, to interested Filipino farmers and farm
owners/managers. A friend and co-parent at TSAA, Noel Sandicon informed me about the seminar. Presentations were made by Eitan Neubauer, Counselor for Intl. Development Corp. (MASHAV), Science and Agriculture, Israeli Embassy in Beijing.

Some data in their dairy farming productivity.

I was amazed by their high tech farming, very high farm
productivity.

Water for irrigation is a big problem, rainy season
is only 3 months a year. The main solution is using effluent, used water by
households and companies, transported several kilometers away for treatment,
and use the treated water for irrigation. The share of effluent water is rising.

Since 60 percent of its land area is desert, plus the need for
residential, commercial, industrial zones on the remaining 40 percent, agricultural land is very small. Thus, soil
less farming via hydroponics is common. Private sector dynamism and innovation
is very clear.

One application of biotech, genetic engineering and producing a
GMO, long shelf-life tomatoes. Fantastic.

Fertigation means fertilizers + irrigation. So the water
that passes through the tubes that nourish the roots contain exact amount of
fertilizers that the crops need, depending on their age (in days). One
advantage of hydroponics and soil-less farming, is that the crops are automatic
organic. Bacteria, fungi, etc. normally live and multiply in the soil. Since
there is no soil involved, no bacteria or fungi enters the crops. Zero
pesticides, zero insecticides, zero fungicides.

Fantastic how they drastically controlled (but not
totally eradicate of course), a big pest that can cause huge crop damage, the
Mediterranean fruit fly.

One big problem in PH mangos, big headache actually, is
cecid fly or "kurikong manga". When they attack, you can expect up to
total crop failure. We have zero mango harvest in our farm the past 3 or 4 years
already because of this pest, which is invisible to the naked eye.

Cantaloupe via genetic engineering again, a new GMO. Nice
and safe to eat.

I assume that it's all private companies developing these
scientific progress. The Israeli government is busy with security matters so
the private sector should be busy with innovation and enterprise competition at
the global scale.

I am not aware if similar high-tech dairy farms are
existing in the PH. Almost all of our powdered milk are imported, the bottled
or boxed liquid milk may be locally produced but they are not exactly cheap.

To harvest 600-1,500 kgs of fish on a small, 1,000 sq. m.
(1/10 of an hectare) pool is too high. One can feed hundreds of people with
just one hectare of land area, continuously, all year round. Fantastic.

I admire the Israeli private sector for these and other
scientific breakthrough in agriculture and food production. Food supply will never be a
problem in the planet as the trend is rising food output per hectare of land
area. "More food for less resources" is the default mode of modern
agriculture.